Overused Gaming Buzzwords

Motion control

[moh-shuhn kuhn-trohl]

kb ps move

No matter what happens with Move, this will always be funny

Industry definition: Motion controls are the surfboard you’ll be paddling when that wave of 3DTVs (see above) drowns you in a sea of immersion!

Real-life definition: “Never mind that you’re already bored of what Nintendo’s been offering you since 2006. Or even the fact that Nintendo made little mention of motion control at this year’s E3. Why? Because we’re doing it in 1080p, dammit! LOVE US.”

See: This image.

Reboot

[rē-bōōt]

nfshp2010

This is Criterion cleaning up EA's NFS mess

Industry definition: An exciting return to a long-running series’ roots — what was old is new again!

Real-life definition: An overdue apology for either an extended absence or several consecutive mediocre-to-awful sequels to once beloved franchises — back to the drawing board!

See: Mortal Kombat, Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit, Medal of Honor

Retro

[reh-troh]

mega-man-10

MM10 -- 10th game in a series, or here to kick your ass in 10 different directions?

Industry definition: A fun way to tug on the heartstrings of longtime gamers by either rereleasing 8- or 16-bit games, or even releasing new games that adopt those same visuals or gameplay elements.

Real-life definition: A fun way to disappoint longtime gamers when they come to the crushing realization that the gamers of their youth aren’t nearly as fun or good as they remember. Sadly, no one thinks of the 15-25 years of game design evolution that have past until it’s too late.

See: Mortal Kombat II (PSN), Hot Shots Golf 2 (PSN), Mega Man 10 (MEGA MAN WAS NEVER THIS HARD).

RTS

[ahrteees]

sc2

This screen either has you giddy with excitement or bored to tears

Industry definition: Real-time strategy. Most popular on PCs due to the difficulty of translating the controls from a mouse-and-keyboard to a game pad, this genre involves micro-managing in-game resources to build and deploy vast armies to vanquish opposing forces.

Real-life definition: Inaccessible genre of games for PC elitists where both your army and confidence are destroyed by a 13-year-old South Korean tournament champion in 7 minutes unless you can learn and efficiently utilize approximately 859 hotkeys. Once you do, you’ll make him work for a whole 11 minutes to beat you.

See: StarCraft, whatever South Korea plays between StarCraft matches

Readers Comments (7)

  1. This article is hysterical. Good job!

  2. Reneid Klein July 16, 2010 @ 17:20

    Good article. Especially the one about FPS. My gosh do I ever agree with that one.

  3. agree with DLC, such a ripoff (MW2) but i still think hot shots golf 2 for the PSN is awesome! lol great article

  4. Thanks, dudes, glad you enjoyed it. 🙂

  5. You don’t like Retro games ? /cries

  6. @Blinky – You know I love retro games (SONIC 4!!!!), but it’s pretty easy to be let down when you haven’t played them in many, many years. Kinda like when I watched Space Jam for the first time since in over 10 years, lol.

  7. Doominator99 July 17, 2010 @ 03:37

    There have been about 15 games with game of the year editions and this generation has only lasted 4 years lol

Comments are closed.